


i hide the loneliness inside of me, and i can't let you feel it, too

by JenelleLucia



Category: Bravely Default (Video Game) & Related Fandoms
Genre: F/M, this is more edea-centric than shippy but i hope you guys enjoy !
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-07
Updated: 2018-11-07
Packaged: 2019-08-20 06:57:50
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 783
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16551092
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JenelleLucia/pseuds/JenelleLucia
Summary: has becomes had, and edea cannot let that happen to agnès. // bsel, in the vampire castle / after the final battle





	i hide the loneliness inside of me, and i can't let you feel it, too

It’s invasive -- it’s  _ invasive _ , and Edea hates it. Yoko’s pouring all of her feelings out for her, that fighting for her cause also just had to come with wanting her father’s recognition, because all her life that’s all she’s ever worked for. All she’s ever worked for, up to now, maybe not just for the recognition is what she covers up with a smile, that she worked every day on this journey, alongside Yew, and Tiz, and Magnolia, that she covers up  _ loneliness _ . 

( _I_ _ t’s invasive. _ ) 

Edea wants it all to stop -- she wants it all to stop and go away, and she wants Ringabel to come back and prove Yoko wrong. Prove Yoko wrong that she is  _ not  _ lonely, that she has someone, too, but her words are like venom and they burn through her thoughts because it’s  _ true  _ and she wants it all to just  _ go away  _ and maybe, she thinks, that it’s right that everyone else has someone and she does not.

It’s a moment of weakness, and for once she’s helpless to it when Yoko knows what she’s thinking. She rubs salt into her wounds -- that Ringabel chose to leave her, and that she wouldn’t have anyone beside her during the times she might need it most, and Edea knows that that’s the truth. Everything Yoko says is the truth and she swears that there’s a brief second where she believes that she deserves it because it’s been three years, and Ringabel has not returned to her. 

(Every day, there’s a sliver of hope that he would.) 

Edea doesn’t know how she’s gone three years without him -- three years, and maybe her thoughts of him were subconscious or otherwise, but she never stops thinking of him. Maybe he might not have consumed her thoughts with every waking day, sure, but there was no doubt that she didn’t  _ not _ think of him. 

And Edea does. She thinks of him so very much even when she doesn’t realize it.

She doesn’t understand how long she’s been standing there, but all the numbness goes away when his arms wrap around her. She can feel her heart sink to her stomach when cool armor embraces her, but she can feel his arms beneath it and they’re strong and there are tears beginning to well up in her eyes.

(He’s there.)

_ He’s there _ , he’s  _ always _ been there, and Edea doesn’t realize how much she actually needed to remember the feeling of his arms around her but she clutches tightly onto him. 

“It’s always about you, isn’t it?” she asks him as she cries into his shoulder. “I - I hate you!” He still holds onto her, tightly but grips so gently, and she can hear him chuckle into her hair, and Edea -- should they ever meet again and in hopes that they never part this time, keeps to herself that she never thought she’d ever miss that. 

“Sorry, I didn’t mean to tease,” he apologizes, then looking down at her. “Now...shall we return? Together?” 

(She doesn’t realize that saying goodbye again was the hardest thing to do.) 

. 

Edea’s at Tiz’s side in no time, and she struggles. She struggles to keep the tears in, she doesn't believe that Tiz was dying, because he’s not -- he’s not dying here, when they all have plans to make together and that Tiz has someone to go back to. They were so close,  _ so close  _ to everything going right again after fighting Providence. They had a new world to go back to, a new world where there was peace and they could all be together as friends and Edea knows that more than anything, _  Tiz and Agnès could be -- were supposed to be -- together at the end of all of this and _

“Please, Tiz,” she can hear Agnès beg on the other end of the pendant. She’s begging, pleading with everything she has and it pulls at Edea’s heart, harder than when Yoko had dug deep into her thoughts, as she sees Agnès there sobbing. “Don’t go…! Don’t leave me here alone! Tiz!” 

She thinks of what Yoko says -- Agnès  _ has _  Tiz. Aside from them, Agnès only ever has Tiz, just as she only ever has Ringabel, and it’s a loneliness they’ve both gone through for three years. Three years, and if Tiz goes  _ has  _ becomes  _ had  _ and Edea has no idea what’s going to happen when plans that they’ve made don’t become a reality, and when they can't be together despite it being part of their plans, and she’s known that feeling far too well. 

  
(That’s the last thing that she wants for them, especially for Agnès -- for  _ has _ to become  _ had _ , because Edea’s been there before.) 

**Author's Note:**

> hi, i'm back on my bravely grind ;; u ;; i was super iffy about this one, but i hope you guys like it!


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